St. Didier of Drogba gives £3m to build hospital

Not his own one to ‘recover’ from his many ‘injuries’, it’s for charity

The Spoiler can’t quite put our finger on it, but Didier Drogba has been strangely likable this season (discount last Sunday’s impromptu Harlem Shake if you want.) Perhaps it’s the undeniably prodigious goalscoring, or the fact there was a massive Drogba-deficit last season. Anyhoo, he’s been a thoroughly entertaining bloke recently, and, dare we say, perhaps now even a nice one.

According to the Daily Mail, Didier has pledged the £3m fee he’s just received for becoming the new face of Pepsi to a donation fund for building hospitals in his homeland, the Ivory Coast. He’s even managed to convince ‘hard-up’ Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich to top up the pot with a few million petrodollars:

Sources close to the remarkable deal also claim there will be a generous donation by Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich in a personal show of support for Drogba.

Sportsmail understands Abramovich may even have offered to match the donation pound for pound.

The charity was set up by Drogba himself two years ago, and is committed to raising funds to build a hospital in his hometown of Abidjan by 2010.

He set up the Foundation after a close friend, Stefan, died from leukaemia and the project gained momentum after 19 fans died and 132 people were injured when a wall collapsed in Abidjan’s Felix Houphouet-Boigny stadium before a World Cup qualifier between Ivory Coast and Malawi in March.

The first aim of the Foundation is ‘to build and fund a hospital giving people basic healthcare and a chance just to stay alive’.

The Spoiler congratulates the Chelsea striker for his philanthropy, but we hope this isn’t the start of a new, clean-cut image. The Premier League needs someone to break up the weekly stream of ‘Sir Alex Ferguson bollocks referee x’ stories.

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